Rowing: Strength in numbers for women's coach Tonks

Zoe Stevenson. Photo / Getty Images

Dick Tonks' women's sculling group looks set to be the fiercest fought area of Rowing New Zealand's elite programme when athletes are named today for the March 2-6 trials at Lake Karapiro.

Tonks is expected to be in charge of the double and quadruple sculls crews again this season.

Last year in the double at the world championships, Zoe Stevenson and Fiona Bourke took silver under Tonks. They slipped 0.04s behind Lithuania in the dying strokes. Some crews are subject to more rigorous 'trials' than others next week. Despite their infinitesimal margin of defeat, Stevenson and Bourke will face tougher scrutiny than if they'd topped the podium.

The quad of Sarah Gray, Georgia Perry, Genevieve Armstrong and Erin-Monique O'Brien finished third in their repechage in Korea, missing the final despite a surge in the last 250m. They're expected to be back in trial contention.

Other names such as Louise Trappitt (who took a year out after the Olympics), Linda Matthews and Eve Macfarlane could also feature. That would mean at least nine athletes contesting six positions.

In the national championships which finished yesterday, each of the names mentioned featured on various podiums. Stevenson, Gray and Perry were part of the winning Waikato regional performance centre crew in the premier quad race. Central RPC's Matthews, Trappitt and O'Brien were in the second-placed crew and Southern RPC's Bourke and Macfarlane were in the third boat, 0.05s back. Armstrong took bronze behind Emma Twigg and Stevenson in the women's single.

The women's double finished with Bourke and Lucy Spoors winning gold for Southern, Stevenson and Gray getting silver for Waikato and O'Brien and Kerri Gowler taking bronze for Central.

Debate remains over whether the women's eight who won the B final at last year's world championships will survive the season's budget.

There is also no decision on whether a men's eight will tour.

RNZ chief executive Simon Peterson said "a carrot" was likely to be offered for the under-23 eight to attend the world championships in Amsterdam during August.

Each of last year's under-23 men's eight are eligible to defend the title they won in Linz, Austria.